arXiv · 2505.00340
Vehicular Communication Security: Multi-Channel and Multi-Factor Authentication
Abstract
Secure and reliable communications are crucial for Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITSs), where Vehicle-to-Infrastructure (V2I) communication plays a key role in enabling mobility-enhancing and safety-critical services. Current V2I authentication relies on credential-based methods over wireless Non-Line-of-Sight (NLOS) channels, leaving them exposed to remote impersonation and proximity attacks. To mitigate these risks, we propose a unified Multi-Channel, Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) scheme that combines NLOS cryptographic credentials with a Line-of-Sight (LOS) visual channel. Our approach leverages a challenge-response security paradigm: the infrastructure issues challenges and the vehicle's headlights respond by flashing a structured sequence containing encoded security data. Deep learning models on the infrastructure side then decode the embedded information to authenticate the vehicle. Real-world experimental evaluations demonstrate high test accuracy, reaching an average of 95% and 96.6%, respectively, under various lighting, weather, speed, and distance conditions. Additionally, we conducted extensive experiments on three state-of-the-art deep learning models, including detailed ablation studies for decoding the flashing sequence. Our results indicate that the optimal architecture employs a dual-channel design, enabling simultaneous decoding of the flashing sequence and extraction of vehicle spatial and locational features for robust authentication.
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Marco De Vincenzi, Shuyang Sun, Chen Bo Calvin Zhang, Manuel Garcia, Shaozu Ding, Chiara Bodei, Ilaria Matteucci, Sanjay E. Sarma, Dajiang Suo. 2025-05-01. Vehicular Communication Security: Multi-Channel and Multi-Factor Authentication. https://arxiv.org/abs/2505.00340
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